THE TRUTH ABOUT
THE BATTLE OF CULLODEN
Royal
arms of Scotland
THE BARRELL'S HELD AT FALKIRK, SO =
When the Jacobite army lined up on Drumossie Moor on 16th April 1746, their
stomachs were empty, they were exhausted from their night march the failure
of which had undermined their already fragile morale, and they were heavily
outnumbered, almost two to one. On the right of the Jacobite line
stood the Athollmen and this place of honour had been given them at the
request of their leader Lord George Murray. To their left were the Appin
Stewarts and then the Frasers. Next came Clan Chattan and the Farquharsons,
followed by a regiment consisting of men of mixed clans, Roy Stewart's
regiment and finally on the left the Macdonalds. Ever since Bannockburn
the MacDonalds had claimed the right of the Scottish line as their own
and this morning they were still bitter at losing their place to Lord George
Murray's Athollmen. There was a second line but the fury of the charge
was such that the first line was the more important. In the second line
were the Irish and Scots soldiers of the French king, the Ogilvies, the
Duke of Perth's regiment, Lord Gordon's men and assorted units of horse.
The government's first line consisted of Pulteney's regiment on the right
facing the Macdonalds, then the Royals, Cholmondley's, Price's, the Fusiliers,
Munro's and Barrel's on the left. It was common in those days for regiments
to be named after their commander. The second line consisted of (from right
to left) Battereau's, Howard's, Fleming's, Conway's, Bligh's, Sempill's
and Wolfe's. Two battalions were held in reserve. At the southern
end of the field, between the armies and the water of the River Nairn,
were two enclosures bound by a stone wall. This wall, almost the height
of a man, stretched from the extreme left of the first government line
to the rear of the right flank of the second Jacobite line. It was a terrible
oversight on the part of the Jacobites to have left the wall standing.
This failure to have the wall pulled down would have a dramatic effect
on the action that followed. The battle began, some say, with a shot
from a Jacobite gun probably trying to hit Lord Bury, a government officer
who had ridden out to make a last reconnaisance of the field. The shot
was unsuccessful and now the government guns opened up in reply. The Jacobite
guns were few, short on ammunition and manned by inexperienced or poorly
trained men. The government artillery was just the opposite and within
ten or fifteen minutes all the rebel guns had been silenced. Soon the government
roundshot were tearing into the tightly packed ranks of clansmen waiting
for the order to charge. No order came and the men stood in impotent fury
as their ranks were thinned again and again by the enemy cannonballs.
To have restrained the clans in their desire to charge was foolishness
of the highest degree. It can only be explained by the lunacy of Prince
Charlie in taking personal command of the army on that day. Never before
had he commanded troops in battle and the victories of Prestonpans and
Falkirk that had struck such terror into the redcoats were the work of
Lord George Murray, an able soldier and one who knew his men like no other.
Prince Charles' assumption of command was the result of vanity perhaps,
idiocy more probably, a total inability to understand the circumstances
of the fight that was to be fought most certainly. It was a disaster. Charles
chose the field himself - a mistake. He listened to the hysterical rantings
of his Quartermaster General the Irish O'Sullivan - a greater mistake.
He held back his men in the face of a killing cannonade - perhaps the greatest
mistake. Eventually, the men went themselves. Clan Chattan were the
first to go forward. Punished by the government guns their discipline broke
and they surged towards the enemy yelling "Claymore!", the order to charge.
The tunes of the pipers rent the air until closing with the enemy line
the pipers gave their pipes to an apprentice, pulled out their swords and
rushed forward with the other men of their name. The Jacobite line was
not exactly parallel to the government one but set at a slightly oblique
angle. As such the clansmen charged with a slight slant to their left.
In the middle of the field the Camerons and Appin Stewarts bumped into
Clan Chattan and seemed to recoil off to the right. This pushed the Athollmen
towards the stone wall. Earlier,Campbell Militiamen
and a force of dragoons had entered the the enclosures on the left of the
government line. They had gone forward and torn down the wall
at the western end, almost in the rear of the Jacobite position. Here
they found a deep sunken road they were unable to cross and Jacobite horse
on the other side ready to dispute their passage. The outflanking manoeuvre
by the dragoons failed but the Campbell Militia now lined the stone wall
and were in enfillade - that most dangerous of positions to an attacker
where his flank is exposed to the fire of enemy troops. The Duke of Cumberland
was not a great soldier but he was careful and more cognisant of military
necessity than his distant cousin on the other side of the field. He ordered
Wolfe's regiment to march forward, and place their backs against the stone
wall and thus form an 'L-shape' with Barrell's regiment. It was a trap
that the Athollmen could neither see (with all the smoke of battle) nor
counter, but one that they had to enter if they were to come to grips with
the redcoats. As Clan Chattan neared the government line the redcoats
began to fire. Along the line the front ranks of each battalion knelt,
brought up their Brown Bess muskets and fired. Stepping aside and to the
back and kneeling down to reload, they made way for the second rank to
fire. Then the third rank and once more the first rank. Soon the soldiers
faces were stained by the powder from the cartridges which they had to
bite open in order to reload. The government fire rolled along the seven
battalions of foot in the first government line again and again and as
the artillery had switched from roundshot to grapeshot (nails, pieces of
iron and suchlike) the effect on the charging clansmen was brutal. There
were twenty-one officers in Clan Chattan when the charge began and eighteen
of them were to die, most before they reached the government line. Incredibly
though, some of them managed to cut their way through
the ranks of Cholmondley's battalion and came up on the second line of
government troops. Fighting singly, their hopeless fury ended on the
points of government bayonets driven home by the men of Howard's or Fleming's.
On the right of the Jacobite line the Athollmen , the Appin Stewarts, the
Camerons and Frasers rushed towards the battalions of Barrell's and Munro's.
Barrell's men had fought at Falkirk and had been one of the few battalions
not to run away. Having successfully held a Highland charge before, they
were confident they could do it again. It was a great misfortune indeed
that the most powerful section of the charge and the part with the least
distance to cross should be faced with a battalion sure of itself and with
less fear than most. The Athollmen never reached the government line. From
behind the shelter of the stone wall, the Campbell Militia poured fire
into the flank of the Athollmen. Running past that threat they then passed
in front of Wolfe's battalion and again were savaged by flanking fire this
time much more intense and deadly. The Athollmen fell back. The Frasers
were halted by grapeshot and musketry but the Camerons and Appin Stewarts
crashed into the men of Munro's and Barrell's. The ranks of the clansmen
had been severely reduced by the the time the clash came and though the
fight was long and bloody both battalions held. Some
parts of Barrell's fell back in the face of the killing broadswords but
they did not break. They simply retired a few yards and formed up on
Sempill's battalion behind them and continued the fight. Lord George Murray
tried to bring up elements of the second Jacobite line but it was impossible
to advance through the now retreating Camerons and Stewarts. Just at that
moment, the Campbells again popped up from behind the stone wall, fired
four volleys and then clutching thier broadswords charged into the dazed
bands of retiring Jacobites. The Macdonalds on the left of the Jacobite
line went forward when they heard Clan Chattan charge. They had, however,
a greater distance to cross and the ground was broken and uneven in front
of them. Again the grapeshot and musketry had a terrible effect and maybe
one third of the Macdonalds had fallen before they were a hundred paces
from the redcoats.Their charge was not one single advance but more a series
of rushes. They ran forward, stopped, fired their muskets and pistols and
went forward again. in front of the government line they stopped again
and fell back, a simple feint intended to draw the government infantry
after them in pursuit. It didn't work, and standing in front of the redcoat
line they were easy targets and cut down in great numbers, much to the
amusement of government officers. By this time the Jacobite right had already
begun to retire and when redcoated cavalry in the shape of Kingston's horse
came up round the right of the government line and threatened the Macdonalds
on their left flank, the clansmen broke and ran. Highlanders had always
had a great fear of mounted men in large numbers and the Macdonald retreat
became a panicked rout. The battle was not quite over yet but at that moment
when the clansmen turned their backs on the government line and started
to drift or run away, Jacobitism was a threat no longer to the Hanoverian
dynasty and a chapter of British history came to an end. The battle
continued though and Walter Stapleton, commander of the Scots and Irish
soldiers in the service of the King of France and now standing on the left
of the second Jacobite line, saw the Macdonalds break and start to run.
He must have known then that the battle was lost but still he determined
to try and prevent it becoming a rout. His men opened their ranks to let
the fleeing Macdonalds pass through them and then reformed to meet the
pursuing English horse. The redcoated cavalry was held and the Scots-Irish
infantry began a slow retreat. Seven times they turned and faced their
pursuers and each time successfully blunted the attack. On the left of
the Jacobite line, the 500 dragoons in the enclosures finally crossed the
sunken road and into the rear of the Jacobite position. Here they were
faced by about sixty men of Fitzjames Horse and a handful of foot under
Gordon of Avochie who even against such great odds managed to slow the
dragoons attack. The English horse under Henry Hawley, who had lost the
battle of Falkirk, seemed disinclined to press their attack with much courage
though they were to prove enthusiastic butchers of wounded Jacobites when
the battle was over. There can be no doubt that many clansmen's lives were
saved by these determined rearguard actions at either end of the Jacobite
line. Walter Stapleton was terribly wounded in the attack by Kingston's
horse and died some weeks later. when his men finally surrendered later
that morning he appealed directly to Cumberland for quarter for his men.
This was granted as they were soldiers of a foreign king and as such not
rebels against King George. There was to be no quarter for the clansmen.
Barely an hour had passed since the opening of the battle when finally
the redcoats were ordered to stop firing and rest their muskets. The cannon
ceased fire soon after. Cumberland rode before his men in triumph praising
their courage and no doubt savouring their cheers of "Billy, Billy." Then
the government line moved forward and took formal possession of the field
of battle. It was over; the battle, the rising of 1745 and the Stuart claim
to the British throne. A surgeon in the government army made a personal
count of the Jacobite dead on the field and reckoned the number to be around
750. This is certainly a low estimate as many had crawled off to die elsewhere.
Higher estimates put the number of rebel dead at 2,000 and if this is so
it represents almost a half of those who had stood for Prince Charlie on
that day. A more probable figure would be somewhere in the region of 1,500.
According to figures later published by the government only fifty of Cumberland's
men had been killed and another 259 wounded. It was the last battle
to be fought on the soil of mainland Britain. God grant that we never
have to see another.
WALL =
The Battle of Culloden
Major James Wolfe
to William Sotheron
Inverness, 17 April 1746
The Duke engaged with the rebel army, and in about an hour drove them
from the field of battle, where they left near 1500 dead; the rest, except
prisoners, escaped by the neighbourhood of the hills.
The rebels posted themselves on a high boggy moor, where they imagined
our cannon and cavalry would be useless; but both did essential service.
The cannon in particular made them very uneasy, and after firing a quarter
of an hour, obliged them to change their situation and move forward some
100 yards to attack our front line of Foot, which they did with more fury
than prudence, throwing down their firearms, and advancing with their drawn
swords. They were however repulsed, and ran off with the greatest precipitation,
and the Dragoons falling in amongst them completed the victory with much
slaughter. We have taken about 20 pieces of cannon in the field and 700
prisoners, amongst which are all the Irish piquets, and broadswords, plaids
innumberable.
Orders were publicly given in the rebel army, the day before the action,
that no quarter should be given to our troops. We had an opportunity of
avenging ourselves, and I assure you as few prisoners were taken of the
Highlanders as possible.... May they ever be punished in the same manner
who attempt the like!
R. Wright. Wolfe. (1864), p. 84.
HELD THEIR GROUND
BREAK THROUGH
